4/06/10 Dear Daniel: Treated to Tracers

"Dear Daniel,

What is the procedure followed by circ staff when tracing items or putting them onsearch? I trace a lot of the AV and I wanted to make sure I am doing it correctly and that they are being looked for. What accounts do the staff use?

-Treated to Tracers


Treated,

There are two not so different schools of training when it comes to conducting tracers and both of them are correct in their own right and vary depending on comfort levels. I prefer to use MilCirc and go to the SEARCH/HOLDS section and put in the barcode number of the item I want to delete. Once the record is open, I click on the item I want to put in missing and place the item on hold by clicking on the "Hold Selected Item" button. It will prompt for a name/acct number, we usually put ILST ILST ONSEARCH as the hold agency.

*FUN FACT!!!!* Whenever you use the "Hold Selected Item" button a window will come up asking if you want to place the item in missing or if you want to place the item on hold. Now sometimes you'll hit hold and it might just say "Place Hold"; if it ever does that, check the "item level hold" tab to make sure it doesn't have any other holds on it b/c this will prevent the item from being placed in missing until the other hold is removed. *MAYBE NOT SO FUN, BUT STILL WORTH KNOWING!!!*

The second version is almost the same in the sense that you open up ILST ILST ONSEARCH in MilCirc and place holds onto the account by going to the HOLDS tab and clicking on "Add Holds". You'll be prompted to put in the barcode number and then you'll be guided onto the bib record screen. Just as above, click "Hold selected item" on the item you wish to place in missing and choose "Place item in missing" when the message screen pops up.

After the items are placed in missing, make sure you delete the hold from ILST ILST ONSEARCH account so the account isn't tied up. Once the items are placed in missing, they'll appear on the OnSearch pages. Now don't get worried if they don't show up on the OnSearch pages immediately! Keep in mind when an item is placed onto OnSearch, the list has to be refreshed by HALAN before it will appear, which if I'm not mistaken is done once a week. Seniors of each floor pull the OnSearch pages each week and usually divide it among their LAs to complete. This should be done weekly and we make notes in the account of the dates we've checked.

I hope I helped!

Daniel